The Best Mistake He Ever Made
by Snowfilly
Summary: Welcome to Night Vale. Every time Carlos thinks he's got the hang of Night Vale customs, a new one trips him up. Or, how Carlos found himself engaged to his radio host.


The Best Mistake He Ever Made

Disclaimer – All characters and settings are the property of Commonplace Books and I am making no profit from their use. The idea of Ragnorak Zombie Day comes from a Neil Gaiman poem, The Day the Saucers Came.

Dedicated, with love and gratitude, to Mel, for shoving a USB stick into my hand and saying 'You really need to listen to this,' thus allowing Night Vale into my life. On balance, the sleepless nights have been worth it.

Carlos spends the best part of an evening wondering if he's done something totally, utterly, irredeemably stupid. He thinks the answer is probably yes; after a few hours of muttering and cursing, a nearby secret police officer cuts into the radio broadcast he's listening to – not Cecil, not just yet – and confirms it.

'Yes, that was bloody stupid. What did you think you were doing? And what on earth are you going to do about the seating plan?'

He doesn't know; that's the trouble. And Cecil – dear, clever, funny, not quite human Cecil- probably won't even know what he's worrying about.

Part of him thinks he would make a damn fine science case study right about now. The effects of an accidental marriage proposal to a not quite human boyfriend on a normally fairly balanced human scientist. The other part is panicking over which part of the proceeding sentence is going to upset his family the most.

Ah, well. What's done is done, although Cecil has warned him to expect a whole sheaf of paperwork in the next couple of days. He'd asked 'like what paperwork, exactly?' expecting something about banns or permits, but apparently it's honeymoon brochures. When he'd asked Cecil how he could possibly have ordered them that quickly – given that the town's internet reverted to dial-up AOL last week and the websites are refusing to play anything apart from trailers for the Fellowship of the Ring – he'd just grinned.

It's nearly dinnertime, and he's not hungry. Too nervous, excited, in the fun meaning of those words. He dances around their front room for a while, until he realises the Old Woman might be watching, and stops. It's not becoming in a man of his age.

Instead, he walks down the street and back, tidies the whole house, evicts three ghosts and a troublesome tarantula – it's wearing a bandanna and carrying a tiny placard saying 'death to the human oppressors'- and waits a while longer.

Cecil's show starts just about on time; a miracle, given what had happened with the glow cloud and the clocks last Friday. Perhaps he should have called him or something just before he went on air and begged him to keep quiet.

Actually, it might not be too late. He's pulled up Cecil's number before he remembers the Station Management thing, which had followed the glow cloud thing last Friday. Cecil hadn't meant to be late for his show, but with time running wild, and not existing at all, simultaneously, he'd been late setting off. Or maybe he'd set off on time and then it had vanished into the dust soaked air of the normally fifteen minute journey between the lab and the station. Either way, they'd broadcast dead air for the first fifteen minutes, and Station Management had not been happy.

No, he's not going to call Cecil at work again, not unless it's life or death. Embarrassment, terminal or otherwise, doesn't count.

'Hello, Night Vale,' and Cecil's gentle voice is soothing the listeners; Carlos feels better already. Curses on the man. He wants to pay attention, not get lost in the sound of his voice.

This isn't his Cecil. Oh, occasionally, he'll use his radio voice at home, for a word or two, only a joke. But this is the way he first heard the man who became his lover, and, in a way, this is how he loves Cecil best.

Sometimes, other times, he's a too real person using the last of the milk or taking the whole of the bed, and Carlos adores him regardless. But this is dream Cecil, the town's Cecil, and he is perfect. And damn it, he's missed what sounded like a pretty good story involving Hirim, Old Woman Josie and fourteen cans of lighter fluid.

'And now listeners, I have some wonderful news for you.'

Oh, here we go, Carlos thinks. Days, no weeks, of not being able to look anybody in the face. It'll be even worse than the handcuffs thing, and he'd had a genuine reason for buying them. It hadn't involved Cecil in any way, shape or form, and not one person in Night Vale had refrained from grinning at him for the next fortnight.

But it isn't; it's a story about one of the re-homed kittens from the men's bathroom, and he's just daring to think that he might have got away with it all, because they've had the weather (which sounds like rain on the way. He's getting used to translating the songs) when Cecil says softly:

'And, my dear listeners, I want you to know. You are the nearest I have to a family and have been for many years. But no longer. Carlos, dear Carlos, has done me the honour of asking if I would be his partner. His husband.'

The shivers that run up Carlos' spine on hearing that word are like nothing he's ever felt before.

'And I, of course, accepted. Listeners, I want you to know just how happy I am right now, how filled with meaning and wonder and joy my life suddenly is. I am no longer alone.'

It's the same tone of wonder that he'd used in announcing to all and sundry that he had a new boyfriend. It scares the life out of Carlos – and he was here on Ragnarok Zombie Day, he knows what that feels like – for how can he ever live up to that adoration? Even come near it?

'And the wedding...Oh, listeners, I want you to know that, when we've fixed a day and a time, or an approximation of time, given our recent difficulties, that we would like all of you to come.

'You have been my friends and you have welcomed Carlos amongst you, and I would like to have you all there to share in our day. Except you, Steve Carlsberg, if you're listening. Seriously. Wearing sandals and socks is not helping my opinion of you any.'

'Cec-' Carlos mutters. There's tears forming in his eyes; he'd never realised it meant this much to Cecil. It wasn't as if they'd even discussed marriage. It wasn't as if he'd even asked the question, but Cecil had just looked and looked at him and knelt down and said 'yes, yes of course,' as though Carlos was stupid for even thinking there might be another answer and now they'd ended up here.

And Cecil sounds so happy.

The radio issues a squawk and then a menacing yodel.

'Oh dear, listeners, that would appear to be Station Management. Um...they appear to be coming towards me, down the corridor. It seems I've been going too far off topic. Umm, here's the weather.'

_You've already done that, Cecil, _and after a couple of bars, Cecil obviously notices because he cuts in with 'sorry, I should have said, this is the long range forecast for tomorrow,' and he's breathing just a little bit too harshly.

He wishes it was possible to take Cecil away from there without breaking his heart.

Carlos' cell phone picks up three messages of congratulations during the weather and a choir of angels appear briefly in the front room. He's not sure if that's significant or not.

The weather and the menacing yodelling finally, finally, stop. He can't tell if Cecil is laughing or sobbing.

'Oh, listeners, I have something amazing to tell you. Station Management, yes, Station Management themselves, were so overjoyed by the wonder and romance of it all that they came and laid a red rose on my desk. Umm. I sort of wish they hadn't, because the after images are burnt into my eyes and my hair is falling out in chunks, but...Listeners, this is extraordinary. Station Management have congratulated me on my wedding.'

It's laughter. Laughter, bubbling up from Cecil's heart, like water through a mountain spring. Has he ever heard the man laugh before?

'Ladies, gentlemen, elsewises, neithers...I hope...I hope that all of you, one day, will be as happy as I am. And now, goodnight, Night Vale, goodnight.'

There's another phone call and two emails before the credits finish, and Hirim sticks his green head through what was a door, apologises for the destruction, and then says 'maybe I should have told you that offering someone a piece of dragon gold is tantamount to a proposal, even if the intention was to do science on it.'

He looks up at the dragon. He knows damn well Cecil has always had a bit of a crush on Hirim, and equally well that the dragon adores him...if by 'adores' you meant none of his heads would consider him suitable for dinner. 'You did that on purpose, didn't you?'

One taloned foot gets a nonchalant wave and carves a gouge out of their wooden floor. 'Oops. Sorry about that. No. I merely thought one of my scales might be of interest to your science studies. Sometimes, we forget that you're not from around here.'

Hirim is smiling at him.

'I didn't mean to get married. Well, not quite like this.'

'Didn't you?' and then Hirim is gone and Cecil is home, and he's never, ever, ever going to tell his radio host that they got engaged by accident.

Many, many years later, over the foot of their bed, there will be a framed poster which says 'Do not meddle in the affairs of dragons, for they are soppy romantics and you will find yourself getting married on dragonback on Midsummer Night and never living down the pink roses.'

It stays the best mistake he ever made.


End file.
